Czech has two ways to say something like "The house was built." One is the participial (periphrastic) passive — být ("to be") in whatever tense you need, plus a passive participle: Dům byl postaven. The other is the reflexive se-passive (covered separately). This page is about the first, the být + -n/-t construction. It is the more formal, more written passive, and it is the one that lets you name the agent and put the spotlight on the result. Think of it as Czech's structural twin of the English be + past participle passive — with one big extra demand: the participle agrees with the subject.
How the participle is formed
The passive participle is built from the verb's stem and ends in -n / -en or -t. As a rule of thumb it patterns with the infinitive:
| Infinitive | Passive participle (masc. sg.) | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| udělat (to do) | udělán | done |
| napsat (to write) | napsán | written |
| postavit (to build) | postaven | built |
| otevřít (to open) | otevřen | opened |
| zavřít (to close) | zavřen | closed |
| vzít (to take) | vzat | taken |
| zabít (to kill) | zabit | killed |
| přijmout (to accept) | přijat | accepted |
Verbs in -at typically give -án (udělán, napsán); verbs in -it / -et / -ět give -en with a stem softening (postavit → postaven, vidět → viděn, koupit → koupen); a smaller set — many monosyllabic stems and verbs in -nout / -ít / -out — give -t (vzít → vzat, zabít → zabit, přijmout → přijat, obléknout → oblečen alongside the colloquial obléknut). The -en type often triggers the same consonant alternations you know from elsewhere (t→c, d→z, st→št): zaplatit → zaplacen, probudit → probuzen, pustit → puštěn.
The basic construction
být + the participle. In the present, third person, být is je / jsou:
Kniha je napsána velmi čtivě.
The book is written very readably.
Dveře jsou otevřeny od osmi do šesti.
The doors are open from eight to six.
Dům byl postaven v roce 1900.
The house was built in 1900.
That third example is the canonical case: a past event reported with the result in focus.
Changing the tense through být
The participle stays put; you shift the tense by conjugating být. This is exactly how English does it ("is built / was built / will be built") — only the auxiliary moves.
| Tense | Auxiliary | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Present | je / jsou | Most je opravován. |
| Past | byl / byla / bylo / byli… | Most byl opraven. |
| Future | bude / budou | Most bude opraven. |
| Conditional | byl by / byla by… | Most by byl opraven. |
Most je právě opravován.
The bridge is currently being repaired.
Nový most bude dokončen příští rok.
The new bridge will be completed next year.
Bez vaší pomoci by projekt nebyl dokončen.
Without your help the project wouldn't have been completed.
There is a subtle aspect contrast worth flagging: an imperfective participle (opravován, from opravovat) describes the process — "is being repaired"; a perfective participle (opraven, from opravit) describes the completed result — "has been repaired / was repaired." So Most je opravován = it's undergoing repair right now, while Most je opraven = it stands repaired.
Dopisy jsou tříděny ručně.
The letters are sorted by hand. (ongoing process)
Dopis je už odeslán.
The letter has already been sent. (completed result)
Naming the agent: od + genitive or the bare instrumental
A real advantage of this passive over the se-passive is that you can name who did it. There are two ways:
- Instrumental (no preposition) — the default, and the form careful writing prefers, for any agent or force: byl postaven dělníky ("built by workers"), byl pochválen ředitelem ("was praised by the director").
- od + genitive — an accepted alternative, used especially for a personal, individually identified agent: byl pochválen od ředitele. It is also the idiomatic way to mark authorship outside the passive itself (kniha od významného autora "a book by a major author"). When in doubt, reach for the instrumental.
Tahle katedrála byla postavena ve čtrnáctém století.
This cathedral was built in the fourteenth century.
Smlouva byla podepsána oběma stranami.
The contract was signed by both parties. (instrumental agent)
Ten obraz byl namalován slavným malířem.
That painting was painted by a famous painter. (instrumental agent)
The instrumental of the agent uses the same case you already meet in the instrumental of means and after many prepositions; for the od option, od is one of the genitive prepositions.
When to use this passive (and when not to)
The participial passive belongs to (formal) and (academic) register — official documents, journalism, scholarly prose, signs, technical descriptions. In ordinary conversation Czech overwhelmingly prefers the reflexive se-passive (Dům se staví "the house is being built") or simply an active sentence with an unexpressed subject. Reaching for byl postaven at the dinner table sounds stiff. The two passives, and how to choose, are laid out on participial versus reflexive and on the reflexive passive.
Common mistakes
❌ Dům byl postavený v roce 1900.
Wrong form for the verbal passive — the long adjective describes a state, not the event; the passive uses the short form.
✅ Dům byl postaven v roce 1900.
The house was built in 1900.
❌ Most je opraven právě teď.
Aspect clash — perfective opraven = the finished result, so it can't mean 'right now, in progress'.
✅ Most je právě opravován.
The bridge is being repaired right now. (imperfective process)
❌ Smlouva byla podepsána od obě strany.
Wrong — od takes the genitive, and the natural agent here is the bare instrumental.
✅ Smlouva byla podepsána oběma stranami.
The contract was signed by both parties.
❌ Dům je stavěn dělníky. (said casually to a friend)
Grammatically fine but the wrong register for speech — use the se-passive.
✅ Dům se staví.
The house is being built. (natural conversational passive)
Key takeaways
- The participial passive = být (any tense) + short passive participle in -n/-en or -t.
- Shift tense by conjugating
být; the participle does not move. - Imperfective participle = process (
opravován); perfective = result (opraven). - Name the agent with the bare instrumental or od + genitive.
- This passive is (formal); everyday Czech prefers the reflexive
se-passive. - The participle takes the short form and agrees with the subject — the focus of the next page.
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Start learning Czech→Related Topics
- Agreement in the Participial PassiveB2 — How the passive participle agrees with the subject.
- The Reflexive Passive (dělá se)B2 — Using se to form an agentless passive/impersonal.
- The Passive: Participial versus ReflexiveB2 — The two Czech passives, their meanings, and when each is preferred.
- The Instrumental as Predicate (stal se učitelem)B1 — Why professions, roles, and changed states after být and stát se take the instrumental.
- Prepositions That Take the GenitiveA2 — The large family of genitive prepositions — do, z, od, bez, u, vedle, podle, kolem, během, místo, kromě, uprostřed — and why the case is fixed no matter what they mean.
- Short-Form Adjectives: rád, zdráv, hodenB1 — The small surviving set of short-form (nominal) adjectives that appear only as predicates — rád above all, plus zdráv, hoden, jist and the past-passive participles — and why they never stand before a noun.